My answers follow. While I've only been officially riding on carving gear for 2 years, I can still remember the day I first saw a carver. It took me a while to get a board, but once I did, I knew why I got a rush watching that guy ripping turns.
Q1: Why Carve:
Carving feels like you've harnessed raw energy and learned to fly with it. When you drop smoothly into a deep carve and you're firing effortlessly through a sweet turn, it reminds you of every sweet spot you've found on any baseball, or any perfectly executed tackle. For a moment, the world drops away and its just you and the carve. Then, you get to do it over and over.
Q2: Feel Limited?
Once you feel the crave for the carve, you quickly begin to search for the best carve. I've never felt limited in my hardboots because I can easily cruise the mountain, but I can also drop into a rail thin turn in a hearbeat. I admit I'm not one for the half pipes, so I don't miss that aspect at all.
Q3: Can resorts make it better for carving?
Yes, Definitely.
First - provide gear and instructors so that people can get started easily. Carving requires rethinking the typical snowboarding experience from: "being able to slide down and have fun" to "being able to use the board to ride gravity with grace and have a ball."
Second - Help raise awareness about carving - both snowboarding and skiing carving. As both groups of carvers make more sweet turns, there will be more across-the-mountain traffic.
Third - Possibly dedicate (at least during some morning hours of the day) certain runs as carving friendly. Grooming runs near the lifts and attracting carvers to it will certainly raise awareness as riders of the lift will certainly see our runs.
Thanks for this post. I can't wait to read the article!
-C